Sunday, March 8, 2009

The Cows in Laos

I am not sure where to begin with this post...So I will begin with a picture of cows crossing the road in Laos. It was a true exodus that lasted about 20 minutes... Anywho, I just spent the past 4 weeks following my heart around Southeast Asia and cannot wait to go back! I left the first week of February (almost a whole week before I was scheduled to leave) to avoid getting trapped by a Volcano on the Alaska Peninsula that never did erupt... love that volcano...

So, I arrived in Thailand and immediately boarded a night train to Chiang Mai. I spent the weekend exploring the city, meeting new friends (hi Shireen and Yens!), seeing good funky reggae, and climbing around on some pretty nice granite. A much needed decompression from the hustle bustle work life that I had been living. I also needed this time to try and get on the same page as my sweetness, Kyle, who has been kicking it since early October when he first invited me to come meet him in Thailand before his epic bicycle journey accross Asia. Chill down mission accomplished in the high heat of northern Thailand; I was off to meet Kyle and Charlie in Bangkok for a little big city life and prep for thier bike trip.

Bangkok was a big dirty city and I am a country girl at heart, so it didn't feel much like home, but I did find a few things to fall in love with.. at the top of the list was this delish pumpkin and scrampled egg dish that we found at a street vendor in Pakret, near Spencer and Breckan's place. Spence, Breck, Charlie, and Kyle are all biking together, so Kyle and I gratiously accepted thier invite to stay for free at their place for a couple days while we worked out some kinks in the city...My time in BKK was filled with great street food, ordered up by Spencer and his mastery of Isan Thai, racing around in Tuk tuks and motorcycle taxis, Kyle eating a Tuna pie at McDonalds, Moan (that is an inside joke, sorry!), getting bombarded by a small herd of thai schoolgirls for an "interview" about Mexico (below), cheap massages, the Temple of the Emerald Buddha, and a visit with my good friend Gabe Schickle from college. The visit with Gabe and the pumpkin thing were definately the best! I decided that I didn't much like BKK, but in hindsight I realize that it is what it is, and it is a very cheap and interesting city to bum around in a for a couple of days.. I would return for a bit, but for a max of 3 consecutive days at a time...

As soon as we could, Kyle and I hopped on a night train down south to begin our most wonderful vacation at the beach! We went to Ton Sai in a long tail boat from Krabi, and stayed in a lil bungalo near the beach. Ton Sai is on the Andaman coast of the Isthmus of Kra (See below). That shot was taken by myself high on the limestone after my last and hardest climb of the day... We spent our days swimming, kayaking, snorkeling, laying on the beach, eating chicken from the chicken lady, and yes... climbing...Ton Sai is a Mecca for climbers and you can climb on limestone formations right on the beach. It was beautiful!! and a great way to begin our adventure together. I really needed some quality time at the beach and with Kyle... once again, mission accomplished.. on to the next chapter of the story... the Gulf side...

We traveled to the Gulf Coast of Thailand to an Island call Koh Pha Ngon (various spellings of this place). KPN is known for its full moon parties which I believe are quite crazy...i.e. if you can imagine it it probably happens there.. we his the spot smack dab in the middle of the moon cycle so it was a bit more mellow than usual. Kyle and I were both glad for that.. as it was crazy enough; we each nearly got nailed by fireballs walking to the bar on the beach...We rented a motorbike one day and explored the island... hiked to waterfalls, swam in one of the most lovely beaches I have ever seen, ate a great curry lunch on the beach, and tried to push the limits of the skooter we rented to a secluded beach down a very long, winding, and steep road. We lasted about 15 min before we decided to abort the mission and head back to our bungalo, just in time to catch a killer sunset on the way home.

The next day we went to Hat Khuat, or Bottle Beach, on the north coast of the island. This beach was SO so lovely and beautiful, nestled into a little palm filled valley with rock formations on either side of the cove, we stayed in a little bungalo right on the beach! The place was so small that it felt like our own private island, but had a couple establishments that added to the ambience and comfort. There were three decent restaurants and a great little swimming pool that we poached one night. Kyle introduced me to spaghetti sandwiches on "cheese toes" (toast, but the locals call it toes) and I got an amazing chicken satay with mashed potatoes! mmm... I am hungry just thinking about it... We loved it so much that we stayed another night and pushed back our plans to go to BKK and Laos. Our second day there was the best day of our vacation thus far.. but truthfully, each day kept getting better... we hiked to a lookout point and chilled out for about an hour. Saw a local dude kill a cobra in the jungle, stumbled upon baby pineapple trees, skirted the coast and scrumpled on rocks till we found our own private swimming cove (shares the title of the loveliest place I have ever been with Havasu Falls), and swung on a giant swing and watched the sunset. Later that evening we swam under the stars in this great little grotto. Very romantic... yep, good day all around...

Back in BKK we wore ourselves out running errands all day long, but got to stay in this awesome hotel in the heart of China town. We ended the evening at a middle eastern cafe, drank a bottle of wine, and chatted the night away. A comfy bed was much appreciated, and the hotel, Shanghai Mansion, was probably the cutest hotel I have ever stayed. We woke up to Kyle's birthday and the excitement of finally leaving for Laos!! We had planned to go to Laos first, but Kyle had to leave his passport in BKK to get a visa for his bike trip, so we were itching to get there! We arrived in Luang Prabang and hiked around town looking for a cheap guest house. This being a UNESCO world heritage site, it is quite popular with the retired crown and many many tour groups seem to keep the prices for guest houses quite high. We finally found one to settle on and went out to dinner to celebrate Kyle turning 26!!! I was quite happy about this, as I am a bit older than him and he always pokes me for that fact... ;)

We fell in love with Luang Prabang... it was so chill... we wish we would have had more time to spend there, we kept saying "next time" a lot when presented with all the things that we wanted to do, but just did not have enough hours in the day to do them... we went full throttle though and gave it our best shot.. we rented bikes and peddled all around town for two days. Went on an elephant ride, did a Laotian cooking class, and explored a gorgeous waterfall!! not to mention ate much great street food, prepared a Laotian BBQ dinner, and made up our own art hop, that turned out not to work so well, as the power kept going out (lesson learned, view art during the day while in developing countries)...

The cooking class was the highlight for me on this trip.. as I love love love to cook! The class included a tour of the local market (which was not in any guidebooks we read) and there I found what could be the cutest baby ever born... it made me want to adopt a Laotian child... hey, I was Angelina Jolie for Halloween...hahah.. seriously...

The cooking class was put on by Tamarind and was awesome! The tour of the market was full of strange and amazing fruits, vegetables, meat things, spice, and of course, lovely people... Kyle and I had a great time during the whole experience and shared some good conversation and great food with the other "campers"... the class was hosted my a Laotian man at his personal farm where he grows herbs, veggies, and fruit organically to prepare meals for the class and his restaurant. We made a Laotian salsa, Kyle made a delish roasted eggplant spread, sort of like Babaganoush, we prepared a marinade and steamed fish in bamboo leaves, stuffed lemongrass with a chicken concoction and fried and grilled it... this opened up a whole new world for me... if you can stuff lemongrass, I ask... What can't you stuff? It was more than amazing!! such a great time.

After the cooking class we booked it to the famous waterfall nearby. We arrived a half hour before close, just in time to have most of the place to ourselves... we hiked up to the top of the falls and back down the other side, stopping at an azure pool along the way. The travertine terraces created a false horizon swimming pool and we floated around for a bit... most lovely..

The next day, we reluctantly left this wonderful village and hopped a bus to Vang Vien... we stayed in a sweet lil bungalo at Maylin's and ate as many banana and chocolate pancakes as we could get our hands on... the picture below is of Kyle putting banana and chocolate pancake on his breakfast sandwich.. with eggs and bacon... that's my man... :)

In Vang Vien we once again rented bikes and took to the dirt roads in search of caves and smiling faces.. we also ended up finding many, many, cows... as referenced above... while we were riding I realized how at home I felt in this place... riding a bike through the villages felt so peaceful to me... we visited a cave, swam in a blue lagoon, and met many little villagers as they passed us with Kyle's broken down bike, eager to lend a hand. The kids are so dang cute in Laos, and always smiling! The simple lives they lead and the buddhist philosophies that the culture follows really show in their smiles. As Kyle and I rode by a school, the boys lined up on the side of the road to give us high fives.

I loved Laos!! We both kept taking note of what we would do the next time we visited this lovely country... next time...

From Laos we traveled to Singapore to meet Charlie so he and Kyle to take off for their epic bike journey. Singapore was a blur of city life, running errands, a small scavenger hunt, eating Great Indian food in Little India, taking pictures of many many lovely orchids, and meeting some really cool people. Kyle left way too soon. Although the start of his trip was delayed by Charlie's bike getting stuck in customs... I still wasn't ready for them to leave just yet... I don't know if I ever would have been ready for Kyle to leave on such a long trip, but que sera, sera... I hope he has the time of his life and I will miss him dearly...

My last days in Singapore were filled with bumming around the city and hanging out with my new city friends, Eko (from Sumatra), Yihmay (from Malaysia/ Singapore) and Jimmy (from Holland). They were great company and I couch surfed with Yihmay and Jimmy, that is how we met. It was a great experience and I will hopefully see all of them again one day on future travels.

Well, that pretty much sums it up. Kyle and I both agreed that this was the best vacation that we have ever had. I feel so grateful to have shared these experiences with someone so dear to me... with the grace, this will be the first of many wonderful vacations together... Laa Kawn! (that means goodbye in Thai)

For a complete album of all of our photos you can go to my Picasa site

2 comments:

Great stuff, Nicole. I often don't really have a lot of interest in people's travel photos, but you are a natural-born photographer. One day you'll have to teach me how to live life and document it at the same time because I've never figured out how. Nice job.